The mothers start arriving around six, trying to get a good place. Salesmen park their carts behind them, selling formula and baby foods and yogurts and everything else.

By eight o’clock, the crying can be heard over the roar of passing rickshaws. To walk through the mothers is to pass through a kaleidoscope of draping silk. They save the brightest fabrics to wrap their babies.

An hour later, the shouting starts.

Sita passes by streets of electronics, lanes of cloth and bead, corners brimming with fruit sellers. No matter which path she takes, the swirling commerce can only lead her here.

“Doctor! Doctor!”

The mothers are worried about soiling Sita’s white coat and each pulls back their hand before they touch her. They thrust their babies out, pushing each other aside to be seen.

She keeps walking. Sita makes a show of looking over one baby, before passing to another. She is just as interested in the mothers, noting the condition of their teeth, skin, eyes.

She spots a beautiful woman in a brown shawl. The woman is not shouting; she holds her baby close. As Sita approaches, a concentrated hush forms around them.

She is passed the child, a newborn boy, less than 2 week’s old. The baby’s cries are loud and healthy. Nodding, Sita returns the child.

“Have you been breastfeeding him?”

“Yes, doctor.”

“Show me.”

The woman blinks.

“Show me how you breastfeed him.”

The woman in brown looks down at her small, humble breasts.

“You’re not the mother, are you?”

“No, doctor.”

“Who is the mother?”

The woman wipes the tears from her eyes. “My sister. She asked me to do it for her.”

Sita walks away.

She does a round, stopping only to look at the smallest child she had seen that year. “Born yesterday,” its grandmother says with a smile. The baby coughs. Despite her white coat, Sita is not a doctor.

The stalls are empty and dark when she returns to the woman in brown.

“I can offer you 10,000.”

“Oh. We thought…”

“10,000 is right. You should do it before he gets any older.”

The woman in brown hesitates.

Sita withdraws a bankcard. She whispers the PIN to the woman, asks her to repeat it; asks her to repeat it again.

“Be quick. Next week I close the account.”

The woman nods.

Sita takes the baby into her arms. Despite the rickshaws, the newborn is sound asleep.

 

“Hello, Mr and Mrs Dawson? This is Sarah from Freeman’s adoptions. I’m fine thank you. Did you have a safe flight from LA? Good to hear. Well you might not be waiting as long as we thought. Yes, I got a call from an orphanage this morning. Someone left a newborn on their doorstep. Yes, poor thing. I saw him today, he fits your profile perfectly. Would you like to see him?”